Air, Earth, Water, Fire and Steel
by Rudolfs0807
Summary: What if Zuko had been better prepared when he first met Aang? What if he took them to the Fire Nation? Follows the adventures of The Gaang with the addition of a character of my own creation. Rated for mild Language and violence. please review
1. Captured

**A/N: This story is what may have happened if Zuko was prepared for an air bender when he first captured Aang in the second episode. I will be changing some events and I will be introducing a character of my own creation. So here we go and tell me what you think of it!**

Air, Earth, Water, Fire and Steel

Chapter 1: Captured

As the fire benders in their identity concealing masks carried Aang through the halls of the ship, the small boy struggled against the chains that bound him. Almost as soon as the fire benders took him from the Southern water tribe, the boy with the scar had ordered him chained up, to prevent him from bending; they clapped iron manacles on him that completely covered his hands and put chains around his legs and attached them to the ones binding his hands. When he tried to escape by air bending with his mouth they tied a muzzle on so he couldn't open his mouth any more than a little bit. The guards tossed him into a cell; Aang whiled away some time trying to get out of his restraints but to no avail. After an hour or so he heard the roar of his flying bison outside; _Oh no!_ He thought, _What's Appa doing here? Oh crap! I bet Sokka and Katara came to rescue me! They shouldn't get captured too…Especially Katara…_About 15 minutes later Sokka and Katara were thrown into his cell.

"Well, so much for that plan," said Sokka, who was sporting a black eye and a few new cuts and bruises, courtesy of the fire navy; he was not chained or tied up. Katara also looked a little roughed up and her hands were shackled behind her back to prevent her from bending.

"Are you guy's ok?" mumbled Aang, still able to talk through the muzzle.

"Yeah," said Sokka, "Just a little sore,"

"How about you Katara?" asked Aang.

"I'm fine. But how are you?" she replied.

"I'm ok; but what are you guys doing here? I told you I would be fine! And what did they do with Appa?"

"Well," said Katara, we couldn't just leave you at the mercy of the Fire Nation could we? As for Appa, the last I saw they were chaining him to the deck of the ship,"

Frustrated, Aang hung his head, "Crap! I should be better than this! Not only did I get captured, but I got you guys captured too! I'm sorry…"

"Don't be," Sokka assured him "Were here because we want to be, well sort of…"

"Thanks," said Aang, "Hey since you're the only one with a free hand can you scratch my nose?"

"Mine too?" asked Katara.

"This is going to be a loooong trip isn't it?" sighed Sokka.

Unfortunately, he was right; the trip passed slowly for the captives. They were fed twice a day; though the guards refused to unchain the two benders, so Sokka had to feed the other two. The boy with the scar, who they learned was Prince Zuko: heir to the Fire Nation throne, often came down to brag. "Well Avatar," he would say trying to provoke Aang, "Your bison will make a fine beast of burden; or maybe I'll just have him put down once I take back my title as rightful heir to the throne. Yes, tomorrow I will once again be crown prince of the Fire Nation and my Father will restore my hon-"

"Yeah, yeah, your honor," interrupted Sokka, "Every day you come down here rubbing the fact that you captured us in our faces and bragging about your honor; I swear, you are every villain from every children's tale all rolled into one!"

"Silence peasant!!" yelled Zuko, "If you are that cheeky with my father, you will be lucky to get away with your lives." And he strode away.

"I swear that guy's ego is bigger than Appa," joked Sokka, causing the others to giggle.

The next morning the three awoke to silence. "Listen!" Sokka said.

"I don't hear anything…" Katara said yawning.

"That's exactly it!" said Sokka "The engines have stopped; we're probably in port!"

They heard footsteps coming down the hallway; Zuko walked up and spoke to the guards "get the prisoners out we're disembarking."

"Yes sir!" said one of the guards crisply.

The door swung open and the guards hauled the trio to their feet and marched them to the large exit ramp in the bow of the ship.

"Wait here a moment," Zuko said and strode down the ramp where he stopped at the bottom; the group couldn't see him any more.

"What are you doing here?" Zuko asked someone they couldn't see.

"Just here with a message from the palace, Zuko," said a male voice.

"You will address me as Prince Zuko,"

"Not yet I won't," said the other voice, "Technically, you're still banished; but your father has ordered you and your captives to go immediately the palace throne room,"

"Is that all you came here to say?" snarled Zuko with blatant dislike.

"Pretty much," said the voice, "Oh, your sister sends her regards."

"Does she now? Well tell her I'll see her in a little bit."

"Will do," said the voice "See you at the palace,"

The trio heard footsteps striding away from the ship. Zuko called to the guards to bring them down; as they stepped out into the sunlight they saw a man in a long, calf length red coat walking away from the ship and towards the giant volcano that dominated the view.

They were taken immediately to the palace throne room. "Ah," said the Fire lord from behind the curtain of fire, "Zuko and Iroh, what an…unexpected surprise. I hear you have some thing for me…and it better be good..." he said menacingly.

"I do, father," said Zuko stepping forward, "I have captured the Avatar."

There were gasps and whispers from all present in the throne room.

"Then why," Ozai thundered, "have you brought me a bunch of children!?!"

"Because, father, the one in orange is the last air bender, the Avatar! Here is his staff," he said placing the wooden glider in front of the throne where a servant picked it up and brought it to Ozai.

"Hmm," said the Fire Lord, "He does appear to be an air bender; but how do you know that he is the Avatar?"

"I can explain that," said Iroh stepping up, "we saw an incredibly powerful light shoot up into the sky from the Southern Water Tribe. We arrived there and the child agreed to go with us if we would leave the village alone."

Zuko nodded in agreement.

Ozai nodded, "And the other two?"

"They attempted to rescue the Avatar by attacking our ship; and so they are prisoners of war and aided and abetted an enemy of the Fire Nation," said Zuko accusingly, "and the girl is a water bender, the last one from the South Pole."

"Excellent!" said Ozai, "Zuko my son, you have earned back your honor; welcome home, Crown Prince," the entire throne room applauded him and the boy smiled for the first time in many months. "Guards!" Ozai ordered, "Take the prisoners to a cell and interrogate them for any information they have on the resistance forces and the location of any remaining Air Nomads."

They were marched out of the palace and taken to the cylindrical prison tower and all three were thrown into a cell. "Ok guys," said Sokka, "they said that they were going to torture us; but even though we don't really know anything we can't give in, we can't give them the satisfaction. It's going to hurt like hell but you guys are strong, I know you can handle whatever they do to us."

"I'm scared," said Katara tears leaking from her eyes.

"Me too," Sokka admitted.

"I'm sorry guys," said Aang, ashamed, "I think that everything would be better if you had left me in that iceberg…"

"Don't you dare say that!" yelled Katara, "We're your friends and were all in this together; no matter what happens."

Aang smiled under the muzzle, "Thanks Katara," he said.

Just then the cell door slammed open and a figure stepped through the door; "Hello peasants," said a cold voice, "My name is Azula and I'll be torturing you today!"

**Yes, you did read that right! I introduced Azula an entire book early!**

**This chapter wasn't all that interesting but I promise the next one will be very exciting!**

**Please tell me what you think of it so far! Review! **


	2. The Sword

**As usual, the only thing I own is the idea and the character I created, everything else belongs to Michael and Bryan.**

Chapter 2: The Sword

Over the next two days Azula interrogated the trio; mainly she used fire and lightning to hurt them. She would ask them questions about where their rebel allies were and if she didn't get an answer she liked, which she never did, she would zap them with a jolt of electricity. She also found that she could elicit a better reaction from Aang if she shocked Katara instead of him when he refused to answer. After one such session the group was trying to pull themselves together.

"I don't know how much more of this I can take," said Sokka, "She's getting more and more extreme with her punishments," he said helping Katara to sit up.

"No kidding," she said weakly, wincing as Sokka leaned her against the wall; she had been taking the brunt of Azula's rage. "We can't give in though; we don't know anything really important, but we do know approximately where dad is; if we even give her a hint, we could put his life in jeopardy."

"I'm so, so sorry guys," said Aang with tears streaming down his face at his friend's pain. "This is all my fault,"

"Actually," Sokka said, "We're the ones who came after you so technically it's our fault! Don't worry about it Aang, what will happen will happen; we can't do anything about it."

"I hope they actually feed us soon," said Katara, "They haven't fed us once since we got here,"

"Yeah, and if they do, I'll just have to feed you two like a bunch of babies!" said Sokka.

"Well at least we don't act like babies all the time," said Katara poking fun at him.

Aang sat there, amazed at his friend's ability to joke even in a situation like this.

The next day there was a slight change in their usual routine: Azula brought a friend when she came to interrogate them. Aang could hear them talking as they walked down the hallway, but couldn't make out what they were saying.

The door to the cell swung open; "Here he is: the once great Avatar," said Azula gesturing grandly.

"Um, Azula?" asked her companion, "Wrong cell; this one just has a bunch of kids in it."

"That's him," said Azula, pointing, "The one in the orange is the Avatar,"

Aang looked up; standing in the doorway was a boy in a long, calf length, red yellow and black jacket. The jacket had no sleeves, but the boy wore red armbands with two black striped on his wrists. Aang realized that this was the guy who was talking to Zuko when they first arrived in the Capital. He also noticed that the boy wore two short swords attached to his belt and the hilt of a larger broadsword protruded over his right shoulder. But the thing Aang noticed the most was the fact that even though it was rather dim in their cell, the boy still wore a pair of dark, wrap around sunglasses.

"Spirits," said the boy, noticing the condition the kids were in, "What have you been doing to these kids? And why does the girl look in worse shape than the others? I thought that the one in orange was the Avatar."

"He is," replied Azula cruely, "The look on his face when I hurt her is much better than if I directly hurt him,"

The boy in the jacket frowned crossing his arms, "I wanted to see the Avatar, but this is just wrong…"

"Whatever," said Azula, "You going to stick around?"

Her companion sighed, "I guess so,"

As Azula stalked towards them, Aang heard a sharp intake of breath as Katara braced herself for what was to come. "So, Avatar," Azula asked, "are you going to tell me where your Air Nomad friends are hiding today?"

Aang's only response was to glare at her.

"So be it," she said, and with out breaking eye contact with Aang, loosed a bolt of lightning at Katara who writhed in pain but didn't give Azula the satisfaction of hearing her scream. Aang glanced over to make sure she was ok, and then resumed glaring at Azula.

Frustrated, Azula strode over to Katara, "Scream, for me girl," Azula said brining her face to within an inch of Katara's, "Scream so I can watch the pain in his eyes,"

Katara mustered all of her strength and spat right in Azula's face.

Azula wiped it off and brutally backhanded her; sending Katara flying into the wall of the cell. The boy in the coat, who was leaning against the cell door with his arms crossed, winced in sympathy. Azula conjured a ball of blue fire in her hand and was about to slam it into Katara when the boy grabbed the Princess' wrist, "That's enough," he said.

"Why!?!" Azula snarled whipping around.

"Because," he answered, "If you kill her, you'll never get any information out of the Avatar; she's your leverage with him."

"Fine…" she snarled and stalked out of the cell. The boy took a long sad look at the tired and hungry trio and left too.

Later that night, a large tray of food was delivered to the cell by a guard with a brand new bag of coins on his belt. The next day Azula came to torture them; and again she brought her friend. The boy watched her hurt them with a look of disgust in his face; and that night another tray of food arrived at their cell. The day after that, the two came to the cell again.

Azula spoke to the guard outside the trio's cell, "Wait at the end of the hall; I'll call you when I need you," this time she didn't bother asking any questions; she just started hurting the Avatar and his friends. After a few minutes of this the boy in the jacket spoke up, "I can't take this anymore, this is just sick!"

"He's the Avatar!" said Azula over the crackle of electricity, "He is the single biggest threat to our nation. He deserves every bit if this."

"He's just a child! You know what, forget this I'm going back to the palace." said her companion turning towards the door.

"You will not leave unless I say you can!" yelled Azula ceasing her torture for a moment.

"I just did," said the boy defiantly, now walking away.

"Heh," laughed Katara weakly, "even your friends think you're twisted,"

Enraged, Azula zapped all three of them with such a strong blast of electricity that all three of them screamed in pain.

Aang fell to the ground; the only thing he could see now was Azula's feet and the open door to the cell. He saw a pair of boots and the fringe of a red jacket appear behind Azula.

"I'm sorry," the boy in the jacket said.

"Oh, so you came back," said Azula, "well, your rudeness is forgiven,"

"That's not what I was apologizing for,"

Aang glanced up just in time to see a flash of silver and Azula smashing into the opposite wall. He looked back at the boy in the coat just in time to see him sliding the broadsword back into its sheath. He stopped over Azula and took a key from the folds of his coat and unlocked Aang's restraints and muzzle. Aang immediately rushed over to Katara, who, he realized, was not moving.

The boy in the coat, came over and checked her pulse; "She'll be fine," he said, "She's just unconscious. All of you will need some medical attention though."

"Wait a second!" said Sokka, "What's going on here!?! I thought you were Fire Nation!"

"I was," said the boy, "But as of now, I'm not; I'm getting you guys out of here."

"Why are you helping us?" asked Aang.

"I have my reasons," said the boy, "Some one's going to have to carry her," he said gesturing to Katara, "and someone is going to have to carry all of your stuff, we'll pick it up on the way out."

"I'll carry Katara," said Aang.

"Are you sure?" asked the red clad teenager skeptically looking at the Avatar's slight frame.

"Yes." said Aang with determination.

"Fine, I guess that makes you the pack mule," he said to Sokka. "Now stick close, the guard at the end of the hallway already went for backup; let's go."

Aang picked up Katara's limp form and piggybacked her out of the cell and down the corridor. Their mysterious new friend stopped at a door about halfway down the hall, which turned out to be a storage closet, they entered and started getting their things together. "Hey," Aang asked, "What's your name?"

The stranger was silent for a moment, "My name isn't important; but some call me The Spider."

Sokka snorted and laughed, "That's a funny name!"

"Hey ponytail boy, shut up and get your stuff loaded; we'll be knee deep in guards soon." retorted the Spider.

They exited the room and headed for the stairs, "Your bison is on the top floor," said their new ally. They were almost to the door of the stairway when about 15 guards piled out and stood, blocking their way. "Stay behind me," said the Spider

"You're not going anywhere traitor," said one of the guards, "I never trusted you."

The Spider's hands drifted to the hilts of his short swords; "I suggest you get out of my way if you don't want to get killed." threatened the spider, his dark glasses glinting in the torchlight; "This is your only warning: move or die."

"No," the head guard said and they all got into fire bending stances.

"Fine," said the spider.

Sokka watched as he drew his short swords out of their sheaths; they were single edged swords and were slightly curved. Sokka saw him leap into the air with surprising agility for someone who just about his own size. He landed in the midst of the guards; much of what happened next, Sokka couldn't see; but the Spider was just a red blur outlined by the flashing silver of his swords which were moving almost faster than the eye could see. It was utter carnage; gouts of blood and severed limbs flew everywhere. The fight only lasted for 5 minutes; but at the end the only one left alive was the Spider. He was splattered with a lot of blood; none of it his own. The two boys stood there; one awed at this fearsome warrior, the other was horrified at the death and destruction.

"Let's go," said the swordsman, "there's more coming,"

They climbed as fast as they could; when they got to the top floor, they found that it was an open floor sp they could easily fly Appa out of it. The Spider cut the chains holding Appa down. They were loading up the last of their things when the door to the room burst open and a voice shouted "I knew you couldn't be trusted!!" Zuko had found them. "You traitor! I will not let you leave,"

"No, I think you will let us leave," said the spider mildly.

"I will stop you!" shouted Zuko fire gathering at his fingertips.

The Spider sighed, standing up in Appa's saddle, "You saw what I did to those guards back there; I will not hesitate to do the same to you. Now, Back. Off." He said menacingly.

Zuko thought about it for a moment, and then lowered his arms. "You will pay for this…"

"Go," the Spider said to Aang sitting back down.

"Yip-yip!" said Aang, and they soared away into the late afternoon sky; leaving Zuko to his shame.

**Well I hope you like it so far! The next chapter may be the last one in this story. I may do more if people really like the character. So tell me what you think!**

**Please Review!**


	3. Shielded Eyes

**As usual I don't own Avatar.**

**This is the last chapter in the Air, Earth, Water, Fir and Steel story. This chapter is all about finding out who this "Spider" character really is. **

**I like this character and I want to do more with him; but please tell me what you think. Is he awesome? Does he suck? I want to know! REVIEW! Ahem, I mean, please review.**

Ch3: Shielded Eyes

As the four flew over the Fire Nation capital, they stayed flat against the saddle; just in case someone decided to start lobbing fireballs at them. They sat up as Appa passed over the Gates of Azulon, "Keep going until you see the shore of the Earth Kingdom," said The Spider, "I'll tell you where to go form there." He rummaged through one of the two bags he had brought along, "Now for some field first aid!" he said holding up a container of burn salve and a large roll of cloth bandages.

Aang directed Appa in the general direction they needed to go and joined the other three in the saddle; he went immediately to Katara's unconscious form, "Hey…Spider…," he asked, "Is she going to be ok?"

"Just a second," The Spider replied, finishing smearing salve on Sokka's back. He handed the roll of bandages to the Water Tribe warrior, "Here, you know how to properly dress the wounds, right?"

"Yeah," said Sokka, cutting a section of bandage off with his boomerang, "Just make sure my sister's ok."

Their mysterious new ally walked over to where Aang was sitting, squatted down and checked Katara's pulse. Satisfied he listened to her breathing for a few seconds; he then placed his hands on her stomach and started to poke around.

Aang angrily slapped his hands away, "What do you think you're doing!" he yelled "I only wanted to know if she was ok!"

The Spider held his hands up in mock surrender, "And I'm trying to tell you; I'm checking to see if there's any internal bleeding. If there is she could die!"

"Oh," said Aang, "Never mind,"

The spider finished his cursory examination, "Well, as far as I can tell she's just unconscious; she should be fine when she wakes up."

"And when will that be?" asked Aang.

"Well. I could wake her up now but I think it's better to let her rest; she's been through a really traumatic experience."

"Okay," said Aang still frowning, "What's your name anyway? I can't just call you 'Spider' all the time. It sounds silly!"

"I'd rather not give you my real name," said the red coated boy, "but you can call me S if you wish."

"Ok," said Aang. Aang studied the swordsman as he helped Sokka tie off his bandages; he realized S couldn't have been more than five foot five, and he looked to be only about 16. Aang wondered how and why a 16 year old got so good with swords.

"You guys should get some rest," said S, "I'm sure you're tired from getting barbecued by Azula for the past three days." Sokka yawned, nodded in agreement and was almost instantly asleep. Aang took one last look at Katara and lay his head down.

Hours later, the two boys were woken up by a jostling. "We're here." aid S.

"Where?" asked Sokka groggily.

"At a doctor's house," came the reply, "I know what you're thinking' and this guy doesn't ask questions, he'll treat you and we'll be on our way. Even if he suspects who you are he won't tell a soul; I would trust him with my life."

"But why do we need medical treatment?" asked Sokka, "You already gave us some!"

"Yeah but it was just some rudimentary stuff to keep the wounds from getting infected."

They entered the hut and carried Katara with them. The old doctor was more than happy to treat them; he got Sokka and Aang patched up and seconded S's diagnosis that Katara would be fine when she woke up. The doctor also gave them some smelling salts to wake Katara up when they made camp. They thanked the man and S paid him a few gold pieces and they went on their way. Aang had Appa fly a few dozen miles and they made camp by a small ravine. S and Sokka set up the tents and got a fire started while Aang fussed over Katara. When they were finished, the sun was almost at the horizon; S uncorked the smelling salts and held the bottle under Katara's nose; as the pungent odor entered her nostrils she made a face and sneezed. "Achoo! Uh? Where are we? Where's Azula?" she asked sleepily.

"Dead," answered Aang glaring at S, "Our new friend killed her when he broke us out."

"What are you talking about?" asked S clearly confused.

"I saw you kill her! You slashed her in the head with that giant sword of yours!"

"Oh, I see; no, don't worry she's still alive I just hit her with the flat of the blade. She was just unconscious." Sokka brought Katara some water and food which she consumed ravenously. S gave her a cursory check up and satisfied that she was fine, sat down by the fire to eat some cooked rabbit that Sokka had caught. After he was finished he pulled out a rag and started to clean all the dried blood off his two short swords.

Aang glared at him from Katara's side, "It doesn't bother you at all does it?"

"Does what bother me?' asked S, slightly annoyed.

"The fact that you're cleaning blood off your sword like it's something you do every day."

"Ok," said S setting his sword down and crossing his arms, "what is your problem? Ever since we escaped you've been extremely snippy with me."

"You're my problem!" said Aang angrily, "You killed fifteen people back there!"

"Well yeah," said S sounding confused, "It's not like they were going to let us waltz out of there; how else was I supposed to get you guys out of there?"

"You could have disarmed them or something; killing them was wrong!"

"So you'd rather be dead then?" S retorted, "Because I can guarantee that those guards were not going to were not going to show us any mercy."

"You don't know that!" yelled Aang springing to his feet.

"I did what I thought needed to be done to keep you guys alive; I had no choice." said S defensively.

"You always have a choice." said Aang.

S was about to retort but instead said "No, I done with this conversation we're out and that's all that matters; this argument is over." He turned away and started walking towards the west side of camp

"No. It. ISN'T!" yelled Aang accidentally sending a blast of air at S; it wasn't enough to knock him down but it knocked the dark glasses right off of his face. Almost immediately S screamed in pain and dropped to his knees clutching his eyes.

Sokka ran to his side, "Hey, You ok?"

"No," the swordsman replied, clearly in pain, "find my glasses."

Sokka only had to look for a few minutes, "Ah, here they are." He handed them to S who immediately put them on and stalked toward Aang.

"Are you alright? What happened?" asked Katara.

"I'm fine your boyfriend here-"

"He's not my-"

"Whatever, he knocked my glasses off just when I happened to be facing the Sun." he said angrily.

"So?" asked Aang

"In case it wasn't obvious enough for your little mind to comprehend, my eyes are extremely sensitive to light; I have to wear these at all times."

"Sorry," said Aang rather insincerely.

S snorted "Phh, no you're not."

As they sat down to finish dinner S explained that his pupils were permanently dilated, so they took in too much light, rendering them all but useless in the daytime unless he wore the glasses; the upside to this was that due to the amount of light entering his eye, he could see things in greater detail, therefore making his reflexes faster than most humans. He also explained that due to this he also had incredible night vision; Aang made a snide comment about how that must be of great help if he has to assassinate someone at night.

"Ok, you know what?" S said standing up, "I'm sick of this if this is how I'm going to be treated you guys are on your own tomorrow." He stalked off in the direction of the ravine. After a few minutes Katara got up and walked the direction that S had

"Where are you going Katara?" asked Aang, "its dark out."

"I going to thank him, which neither of you bothered to do." She said sternly. She found him sitting at the edge of the ravine with his legs dangling over the cliff; his head was raised up staring at the sky. "He doesn't hate you, you know," she said, he hates what you did."

"Hmm," S replied, somewhat disbelievingly.

"It goes against everything the monks taught him in the Air temples."

S sighed, "Yeah, I know,"

"Anyway," she continued sitting down next to him, "I just wanted to thank you for rescuing us from that sadistic bitch, back there."

"No problem," S replied, somewhat surprised at her use of language, "Someone needed to do it; and I was right there."

She glanced over at him and realized that h wasn't wearing his glasses; she saw that where the color of his eyes should be there was only black with a ring of brown, his natural eye color, around the edge.

He must have noticed her expression because he laughed humorlessly, "Unsettling, isn't it."

"Um, no- I mean," she stuttered, "I thought you always had to wear the glasses,"

"No, I take them off at night, provided there are no light sources around, like a camp fire."

"How good is your night vision?" she wondered.

He pointed to a small patch of sky, "How many stars do you see in that little patch of sky?"

"About a couple dozen."

"I can see a couple hundred." He replied, "These eyes are a blessing as much as they are a curse; with them I'm able to fight better than most humans are able, and I can see the beauty of the night sky like no one ever has before." They sat in silence for a few minutes just admiring the band of the Milky Way across the sky.

Then: "Why did you free us?" the water bender asked.

"Hm?"

"Why would you free three peasants you'd never met before at the risk of your life? I mean you had a job in the palace, and you were friends with the Princess, why would you give that up?"

"I rescued you because I was sick of what the Fire Nation was making me do and of what they were doing to the world. When I saw Aang in that cell, I knew that he was special; and I know that he had to live so he could save the world. I want the world to be at peace again; I don't want my children or anyone's children to have to go through what I did…"

"Why? What happened to you?"

"It's a long story…"

"I've got time."

He looked at her a small smile crossing his face. "Okay," he said, and began his tale.

**I was originally going to have this be one big chapter but it was getting rather long so I decided to break it up. Next one up shortly!**

**Please review!**


	4. The Gift

**This is the last chapter in the story; it turned out pretty good**

**But…**

**I like this character and I want to do more with him; so please tell me what you think. Is he awesome? Does he suck? I want to know! REVIEW! Ahem, I mean, please review.**

Chapter 4: The Gift

He began to tell his tale: "One day sixteen years ago, a traveling sword master wandered into a village and saw that it had been destroyed by a Fire Nation raiding party. He saw no survivors; but just as he was about to leave, he heard a noise coming form the rubble of a building. Upon investigation, it was revealed to be a baby boy, not more than two months old. As he picked the boy up he was given a vision: he saw that the boy would be influential in the downfall of the Fire Lord and needed to be trained. The swordsman's own village had been destroyed so he had no love of the Fire Nation; so he raised the boy as his own."

"Did he really see all that?" asked Katara.

"So he claimed," replied S shrugging, "Well obviously that baby was me; but there was trouble almost from the start: due to my disability," he said gesturing to his eyes," "there was no way I could learn to walk since I couldn't open my eyes. So he devised the first pair of these," said S pulling out his glasses, "Once I had these I learned very quickly; from almost the time I could walk, I was instructed in the ways of swordsmanship. He taught me every martial art he knew; if he didn't know one, he took me to some one who did. Due to this, I am at the very least, proficient at almost every form of combat, not including bending, ever created. When I reached the age of eight, my master had me forge my first sword. At age ten I killed my first Fire Bender; when I was eleven I bested my master in a sparring match for the first time.

When I was thirteen, my master gave me this," he said taking the broadsword off his back and placing it in his lap, sheath and all, Katara noticed that it was extremly ornate. " it was his most prized possession, he had gotten it form his master who had gotten it from an Air monk."

"An Air Monk?" asked Katara, surprised.

"Yeah, it's purely ceremonial of course; but it's the finest sword you'll ever see. Then he gave me his jacket, also from the same Air monk, and said that if he wasn't back in one hour, I should run and get as far away from the area as I possibly could. And then he left, off to ambush a Fire Nation convoy."

"You didn't listen, did you?" asked Katara.

"Hell no! I was thirteen, of course I followed him! By the time I got there they had already taken him out. As I stood there in shock; one of the girls in the party came up to me; she said many comforting things and convinced me to go with them."

"It was Azula wasn't it?"

"Yeah; I was extremely confused about all this because I had been trained to kill Fire Nation troops all my life and now all I was getting from them was kindness! Eventually I came to accept them as my friends. So that's how I had gotten to be friends with Azula and ended up in the Fire Nation."

"Wow," said Katara, clearly impressed, "You had an incredible childhood,"

"No, I didn't," said S seriously, "It was lousy; from the time I could hold a sword, I was trained to be a living weapon, a killing machine; no one should have to live like that."

"So killing is second nature to you."

"Yeah, it is." He said with regret in his voice.

"Well, if you want to stay with our group, you're going to have to do something about that."

"Yeah, I know." said S, but said nothing more. After a few minutes of silence there was a rustling from the trees of someone leaving.

"You realize Aang heard every word we just said," Katara said, smiling slightly.

"Yeah, I meant him to; I knew he was there the whole time. Well, thanks for letting me vent like that; I needed to get that off my chest."

"No problem," she said getting up, "See you in the morning!"

"Night," he replied. his eyes lingered on her as she left then he resumed staring at the sky.

The group woke the next morning to find that S was still there; he was sitting cross-legged with a green and brown jacket in the colors of the Earth Kingdom spread out in front of him. He was in the process of transferring the contents of his Fire Nation jacket to the other one. Sokka noted that there were many weapons going into the many pockets on the interior of the jacket, including knives, shuriken, smoke and fire bombs and several other things. Katara noted that he wore a tight, black, sleeveles shirt; and black pants tucked into his boots.

"Hey," the swordsman said.

"Morning," replied Sokka rubbing his eyes, "What are you doing?"

"Just switching my stuff to my other jacket; I'm going to be traveling the Earth Kingdom so I'll need to blend in. Oh, that reminds me," he said rummaging through his bag, "I have something for you," he sid to Aang, he pulled out a yellow and orange jacket, "This was given to my Master's master by an Air Monk, I believe his name was Gyatso, since you are the last Air Bender I thought you should have it."

"Hold it!" yelled Aang, "Did you say Gyatso? He was my mentor! That was his?"

"I think so. Oh, he also gave my master's master this," he said producing the Air Monk sword, "It's purely ceremonial; they're both yours if you want them."

Aang's face lit up then got suspicious, "Wait a second, you're just trying to get back into the group; nice try."

"Okay look, Avatar boy, I won't apologize for what I did at the prison, but I promise from now on that I will only kill if I absolutely have no other choice."

Aang crossed his arms and glared.

"I want to help you guys!" pleaded S, "I want to see the world returned to peace! I don't want any other kids to become… what I've become..." he said looking at his feet.

Aang's expression softened, "Do you really promise not to kill anyone, unless you don't have any other choice?"

"Someone once told me that there's always another choice," said S a smile slowly spreading over his face.

Smiling also, Aang stuck out his hand and the Swordsman took it, "Aang," said the Avatar.

"Shio," said the swordsman.

"Well Shio," said Aang, "you can keep your jacket and Sword, I dont need them, but welcome to Team Avatar."

**Well what did you think? Does this character make an interesting addition to the team? Tell me what you think! **

** do you like how this is turning out? tell me!**

**Until next time!**


	5. Sparring

**A/N: Well this was supposed to be a 4 chapter story but I like it so much that I decided to toke it from the beginning of the series to the end so here's the next chapter!**

**As always, I don't own Avatar. Please Review!**

Chapter 5: Sparring

It was a day later and Shio was stalking through the forest. He stopped and tilted his head as if listening to something; "I know you're out there," he said, "You can't hide from me!" he stood there for a few moments, looking rather vulnerable, carrying a pair of three foot sticks in place of his ninjato swords. **A/N: Ninjatos are just short, three foot long swords. **Suddenly a blast of air shot form the treetops; the green clad teenager easily sidestepped the attack.

Then, from directly above the swordsman's head came a rustling sound followed by a yell of "Sneak attack!" as Sokka dropped down, trying to hit him with his club. Shio evaded Sokka's drop from the trees and blocked the warrior's wild swing with his sticks. While Sokka kept him busy, Katara snuck up from behind and tried to nail him with a stream of water; unfortunately he dodged to the side and the stream hit Sokka instead, sending him tumbling. Aang dropped from the trees and began to attack their opponent with a series of air assisted blows with his staff. Shio managed to block most of Aang's attacks but got a grazing hit to the side that briefly knocked him off balance.

Sokka and Katara rushed back in and Shio knew he would have to up the ante: he went on the offensive. As Katara came at him with another stream of water, he pivoted to his left, spinning around and taped her lightly on the side off the head with one of the sticks; "Dead," he said as Katara dropped to the ground in an over exaggerated fake death. Then as Sokka ran at him he swept the warrior's feet out from under him and poked him with the stick right where Sokka's heart was, "Dead," he said again. Aang hit him with a blast of air and managed to knock him back, but Shio bounced right back and after a brief scuffle, tagged Aang in the head too, "And dead."

* * *

The other three groaned and sat up as Shio sat down cross-legged. "Well," Sokka asked, "How'd we do?"

"Well, um..." said Shio, trying not to offend anyone.

"Oh, come on," said Aang, "You wanted to evaluate our fighting abilities. So be honest with us."

"And for the record," added Katara, "That fight was totally unfair. You're a much better fighter then we are."

"Ok, Ok," said the swordsman, "Honestly, you guys are…decent…fighters,"

"But…" Aang added, sensing the unsaid word.

"But, I've seen better. If you guys want to take on the Fire Nation you're going to need to be much better than that."

"Ok," said Sokka nodding, "What can we do to improve?"

"Well, for starters, Sokka: it's not a sneak attack if you yell sneak attack." This drew laughter from the other two. "Your attack form and stances need a lot of work too. Katara, I know that you haven't really had a master to study under so there's not much I can do there; but you do need to improve your standard hand to hand combat skills. Aang, since you're the only one who actually managed to hit me, you don't really have too much to work on, but you need to be less predictable, throw in a feint now and then. "

"Well that's all fine and dandy," said Sokka, "But how are we supposed to get better?"

"Easy," said Shio, "I'll train you."

"Huh?" said three voices in unison.

"Well I do have fifteen years of martial arts experience; so we should put it to good use."

"I think it sounds like a good idea," said Katara, "I want to be better at fighting so I can kick that stupid princess into the next century."

"That's the attitude we need! I would like to spend a day with each of you working on specifics."

"You mean now?" asked Sokka.

"Sure why not? It's not like you guys have any urgent plans to go anywhere."

"Um, actually we do," said Aang.

"Yeah," added Katara, "We kind of want to head to the North Pole so Aang and I can learn water bending."

"That's a very good idea," commented Shio, "But I think you can spare a few days; besides along the way we're going to see a lot of Fire Benders and I can't be hauling your asses out of the fire all the time."

Sokka sighed, "You have a good point. Can we start today though? I don't want to stay here any longer than necessary."

"That sounds good; I'd like to start working with Aang since he has the least amount of work to do."

"Ok," Aang got up and assumed a fighting stance.

* * *

Throughout the rest of the day Shio and Aang worked on Aang's technique. Often the sounds of the two sparring could be heard coming from the forest. They joined Sokka and Katara for lunch and dinner then went back to training. Late that night, as Katara was about to climb into her sleeping bag, Aang plodded back into camp looking worn out but satisfied.

"Well?" Katara asked, "How was it?"

He flopped down next to her sleeping bag, "It was awesome!" he said, "Shio actually knows some air bending moves!"

"How does that work? He's not even an air bender."

"He said that his master's master studied with the Air Monks for a time and learned some of their techniques. Shio just uses them for physical attacks, but he was able to show me some flaws in my stances and form."

"Wow," she said impressed "That's really cool."

"Yeah," said Aang, "He said to tell you that you're up tomorrow."

"Ok. Good night Aang."

"Night, Katara."

Over the next two days Shio worked with Katara and Sokka in turn. On the third day, before they left the area, they all got together to try to fight the group's newest member. This time all three of them managed to hit Shio several times; this was mostly due to the fact that they were able to coordinate their attacks together this time. After they were finished he bowed to them, "Great job guys, you've all improved a lot. You can still be better though, we can work on it more on the way to the Pole." They were just about to head back to camp to get packed up when they heard a loud crashing coming through the trees.

"Treetops! Now!" whispered Aang and they all shinnied up the nearest tree. As they perched on a large branch a squad of Fire Nation troops rode through on komodo rhinos passed right underneath them; at the head of the group was a familiar face: Prince Zuko. After the fire benders had passed they waited a few minutes in the tree. After Sokka had checked for vibrations using his knife and the tree they dropped down to the ground.

Suddenly, a voice yelled "There they are!"

"Damn!" cursed Shio, "Run! Get to the camp. The he let the other three run ahead of him and he brought up the rear. As several rhinos charged at them he fished into his jacket and brought out two explosive devices. "Cover your ears and don't look back!" he yelled to the others. He lit the fuses and tossed them at the approaching beasts and riders. A deafening boom and a brilliant white flash came from behind and the pursuit was stopped.

As the group ran into camp and began packing up, Aang approached the swordsman, "You didn't kill them did you?"

"No, those were flash-bang explosives. They temporarily blind and deafen. I made a promise and I intend to keep it."

The group breathed a sigh of relief as they took off and left the campsite behind. "Was that Zuko?" asked Katara.

"Yup," said Sokka, "He's back. The question is, why? His father gave him his honor back."

"Hmm," pondered Shio, "Maybe he took it back. Zuko let us leave without even putting up a fight to stop us. That's considered cowardice in the Fire Nation."

"Great," said Aang, "Now we have to watch out for him too,"

"Yup," said Sokka, "What do we do now?"

"Well," said Aang, "I thought since we just spent three days training we might go somewhere and do something fun!"

"That's sounds good," said Shio, "I could use a little R and R. what did you have in mind?"

"I thought we could go to the Southern Air Temple; so I can show you guys where I'm from."

"That sounds good!" said Katara and Sokka agreed.

As Aang pulled on the reigns and directed Appa where to go, the group relaxed and got settled for the long journey. In the distance the twice-disgraced prince screamed his frustrations to the sky.


	6. Reunion

**A/N: From here on out I will be following the Avatar timeline. I may skip a few episodes here and there, only the ones were the addition of my character would have changed nothing. This story picks up as the group is leaving the Southern Air Temple.**

**Also, for those of you who read the first few chapters, i decided to change Shion's name to just Shio. just an Fyi so there's no confusion.**

**Please Review! I live for the Feedback people! I' will even take the time to reply to your review if you sign it!**

Chapter 5: Reunion

As Aang looked forlornly back at the receding Southern Air Temple the other three settled back for the long journey ahead of them.

"So," said Sokka, breaking the silence, "Where are we going Aang?"

"Well," said Aang pulling out a map and coming to sit with the rest of them, "I thought we'd go here," he said pointing to an island, "There's something I want to do there."

"Well," Shio commented, "It's on our way to the North Pole so I don't see why not. Besides we'll have to stop for supplies soon since Aang burned up all our seal jerky."

Aang grinned sheepishly, "Well it's settled then," he said, he rubbed his eyes, "I'm gonna take a nap," he curled up in one corner of the saddle and Momo curled up right next to him and he was soon asleep, exhausted by his ordeal with the Avatar state.

"Hm," said Shio thoughtfully, a wry grin on his face, "If you two are his family, then what does that make me?"

The Water Tribe girl turned with a smirk on her lips, "Oh, you can be the weird cousin that no one talks to!" this caused the other two to laugh.

"A water bender with a sense of humor; I'm starting to like you more and more." said Shio.

Katara looked closer at the now blue clad swordsman; he had changed into a long sleeved jacket when they had got to higher altitudes due to the cold. The jacket was several shades of blue with some white patches mixed in. "May I look at that?" she asked.

"Sure." he said. He took the jacket off and handed it to Katara, "Careful it's a bit heavy,"

"Oof! It sure is! I know you have a lot of stuff in it but it shouldn't be this heavy!" she said admiring the stitching and handiwork.

"I put weights in some of the pockets so I get a workout everyday just from moving around. Also if I'm ever faced with a really tough opponent, I can take it off and be able to move even faster than before."

"That's a good idea." said Katara, "Where did you get this?" she asked examining the fur-lined coat, "It looks like Water Tribe work."

"I had it commissioned when I was visiting the Northern Tribe about eight years ago. I was studying water bending at the time and I got sick of freezing my butt off every day." He noticed the confused look she was giving him, "Oh, I was just studying the technique, it's useful in hand to hand combat; I can't bend."

"Oh, that's cool," she said handing the jacket back.

"Yup."

They lapsed into an awkward silence for a time; then Shio offered to help Sokka sharpen his weapons, having noticed that they were rather dull. So they flew on towards their destination.

A few days later, Aang had gotten them hopelessly lost. "You have no idea where you're going do you?" Sokka asked Aang as he looked at the map.

"Well, I know it's near water," said Aang.

"Well, that narrows it down," commented Shio, "considering that we're in the middle of the freaking ocean!"

"I guess we're getting close then." said Sokka sarcastically.

Aang tried to impress Katara with an Air bending trick; which she ignored due to her concentration on her mending of Sokka's pants. Sokka made a rather sexist comment which got Katara all pissed at him. About an hour later they arrived at their destination. As Appa touched down they all piled off and stretched.

"Do we have to stop now?" asked Sokka, "We just made a pit stop yesterday!"

"Well, Appa's tired already!" said Aang rather unconvincingly.

Suddenly something hurled itself out of the water into the air; "Look!" shouted Aang.

"Holy crap!" exclaimed Shio, "That is one big fish!"

"Actually I think 'Holy carp' might be more appropriate in this situation." said Sokka smiling.

"Nice one!" said the swordsman, slapping him a high five.

"Actually, that's an Elephant Koi! The reason we're here!" Aang said as he stripped down to his underwear, "I'm gonna ride it! Watch this Katara!" he dove into the water and grabbed a hold of one of the monster fish; showing off to Katara as he rode it.

"Not too subtle, is he?" commented Shio.

"Huh? What do you mean?" asked Katara.

He raised an eyebrow, and sighed, "Never mind."

Katara ran back to stop Appa from eating some of their supplies, when Sokka suddenly spotted something in the water. He yelled a warning to Aang, but the Air Nomad only realized that something was wrong when the beast's giant fin rose out of the water behind him. At this point Aang ran so fast that he actually ran over the surface of the water; he couldn't check his momentum when he got back to shore and ended up plowing right into Sokka.

"Yeah," said Sokka rubbing his head as Aang got dressed, "I think it's time to go." Suddenly several green blurs dropped from the treetops and quickly subdued, blindfolded, and tied up the group. "Or not,"

They were taken to the small village and tied to the statue of Avatar Kyoshi in the town square. The village leader and the leader of the warriors that had ambushed them demanded to know who they were. When Sokka made a sexist comment about how a "bunch of girls" could never have taken them down, the all female squad took great offense. Aang said that it was his fault and when it was eventually revealed that he was the Avatar. The village was instantly elated and they were released. Sokka had noticed Shio looking at the head of the Kyoshi Warriors with keen interest. As the group headed into the village with the villagers Shio walked up to the girl.

"Hi!" he said, "I think I know you from somewhere, but I can't place your face. Have we met before?"

"I don't think so…" replied the Fan master uncertainty, "I would have remembered a sword like that," she said admiring the sword attached to the bandolier across his back.

He peered at her face closely through his glasses, "Wait…Suki?"

Startled, she took a closer look, "Shio? Oh wow, it's so good to see you!" she exclaimed hugging him.

"Wait a second!" Sokka said clearly confused, "You two know each other?"

"Yep!" said Shio, "I trained here for about three months. Suki here was my sparring partner, and fellow student. My master wanted me to learn all kinds of martial arts so he took me here to learn the fighting style of the Kyoshi Warriors."

"Yeah, that was seven years ago." said Suki.

"Time sure does fly. This place has changed quite a bit though; I didn't recognize it when we landed."

The two friends walked off talking and reminiscing about the time they spent training on the island. The group was given rooms on the upper floor of the Kyoshi Warrior's Dojo and they made themselves at home.

The next morning the group woke up to an excellent breakfast. Sokka was still fuming about the fact that he had been beaten by some girls and decided to confront them directly. Shio tagged along because he wanted to talk to Suki some more, and he wanted to see what would happen. Sokka ended up getting his ass handed to him by Suki and walked out in humiliation. Shio spent some time getting caught up with Suki, and then amused himself by watching Aang get chased around the village by a bunch of pre-teen girls, and seeing Katara pretend not to notice or care. Later in the day, Aang dropped in on Katara as she was practicing a little water bending; he announced that he was going to ride the Unagi, the dangerous monster that almost ate him the day before.

Katara's only reply was, "Good for you…"

"You're not going to stop me?"

"Nope, have fun,"

"I will!"

"Great!"

"I know it's great!"

"I'm glad you know."

"I'm glad you're glad!"

"Good!" said Katara losing her concentration on the water.

"Fine!" shouted Aang and stormed out of the room.

Shio, who had heard the whole conversation, poked his head into the room that Katara was in, "You two fight like an old married couple," he commented with a smirk on his face.

"We do not!" Katara denied, turning bright red.

After about an hour the Water Tribe girl decided to go find the Air Monk just to check on him. She arrived just as all the girls that he had been trying to impress were leaving. They both apologized for being so rude to each other earlier and Aang started to swim back to shore; suddenly the Unagi surfaced right under Aang and shot him high into the air on its massive head. It tossed him around a bit before Aang lost his grip and landed in the water, unconscious. Katara quickly swam out to the unmoving boy, yelling his name; she reached him and blasted them both back to shore with her water bending just as the Unagi slammed it's body down in the spot they had just been in. as she scrambled to get herself and Aang to cover, the Unagi blasted the area with water, trying to draw them out of hiding. As she peeked up over the boulder she was hiding behind, she saw a Fire Navy ship off load a squad of Komodo Rhinos, with a familiar face at the head of them. "Zuko…" she said Venom dripping from her voice. She quickly extracted the water from Aang's lungs; he coughed and weakly advised her never to ride the Unagi.

Meanwhile, in the village, Sokka had sucked up his pride and asked Suki to train him; he had been at it for several hours now and had made some progress. He was sparring with the fan master while Shio watched the two, when the village leader came to them and informed them that the village was being invaded by fire benders. They quickly sprinted into the village and took up positions on the roofs with the other Kyoshi Warriors. As the troops mounted on rhinos came into the village they sprang their trap; several warriors leapt from the rooftops and knocked several riders off their mounts. Shio leapt from his position, and knocked a fire bender from his saddle, then slashed a flesh wound into the rhino's flank causing it to panic and run off. Suki rushed the Fire Prince, who was hanging back from the rest of the group, but was swatted away by the beast's tail. The angry prince sent a blast of fire at the fallen warrior, but Sokka stepped in front of it and blocked it with a fan.

"I guess training's over," he said.

Another Kyoshi warrior knocked Zuko from his saddle and Suki, Shio, Sokka and another Kyoshi warrior surrounded him.

"I will capture the Avatar this time!" he growled, "And you," he said pointing to Shio from his position on the ground, "I will kill you personally for what you did to my sister!" he lashed out wit his foot sending a wave of fire out that knocked everyone down. He jumped into the street and yelled a challenge to the Avatar.

"Hey! Over here!" yelled Aang and they started to duel. The battle was actually quite brief and ended with Aang blasting Zuko through a house with the aid of a couple fans. He flew to where Katara was, "Look what I brought to this place," he said.

"It's not your fault," said Katara, "but if we want this village to survive, we need to leave; Zuko will follow us."

Aang hung his head, "You're right, I'll call Appa."

They quickly left but not before Sokka got a kiss on the cheek from Suki. Shio smiled as he saw this, "Come on lover boy! We gotta go!"

As they flew over the village Aang knew he had to do something; in idea occurred to him and he dove into the water, resurfacing moments later on the head of the Unagi. He used the giant sea monster as a fire hose and doused the town with water. He returned to Appa, "I know, I know," he said, "that was stupid and dangerous,"

"Yes it was," said Katara and hugged him tightly.

The look of joy on Aang's face made Shio smile; but he also, to his surprise, he felt a twinge of jealousy . His eyes suddenly pained him, "Ow," he said putting a hand to them.

"You ok?" asked Aang.

"Yeah, I just don't like fighting fire benders; even with my glasses the fire hurts my eyes."

"Well you should probably get used to it," said Sokka, still dressed in the robes of the Kyoshi Warriors, "I have a feeling that we're going to see a lot more of them from now on."

**Well that wraps up this chapter. The next one will probably be their visit to see King Bumi. **

**I'm thinking of changing Shion's name to Shio instead; please tell me what you think; of both the name and the story! Please review!**

**Until next time!**


	7. Parents

**As Always, me not own Avatar**

**This chapter picks up after "The King of Omashu" I decided to skip that chapter because Shio wouldn't have changed anything. **

**As usual please review! I love feedback, good or bad! **

**If you love it, tell me! If you think it sucks, tell me!**

**Anyhoo, enough begging, on with the story!**

Parents

The four made a stop at the Earth Kingdom city of Omashu and had a very interesting few days as the guests of one of Aang's old friends: King Bumi. After he wished them luck they had went on their way. Currently they were camped out in the forest and Sokka and Shio were returning after searching for food.

"Oh, boy! Dinner!" exclaimed Aang.

"Not much of one," said Shio shaking his head, "There's really no wildlife around to hunt so we had to settle for a bunch of nuts."

"Yup," said Sokka, "We got round, oval and rock shaped nuts; but I'm pretty sure those are just rocks."

"Aww," complained Aang, "We haven't had a decent meal since we left Omashu,"

"You're telling me," said Shio, "I've lost like five pounds since we left the Fire Nation,"

Suddenly they all heard a big boom. "Ok," said Sokka looking around, his eyes big, "What the hell was that?"

"I don't know." said Aang.

The sound repeated itself and the group rushed over to see what it was. They saw a boy who was a little older than Sokka practicing earth bending in a ditch. Sokka told them all to be cautious but even as he said that Katara was climbing over the log to say hi to the boy. She yelled a greeting; but upon hearing her, the boy turned and ran bringing down a portion of the ditch in order to cover his escape. They figured that they boy had to have run somewhere so they went in the general direction he had fled.

They soon arrived in a small town. Glancing over at Shio, Katara noticed that he looked distinctly uncomfortable.

"Everything ok?" she asked.

"Yeah," he answered, rather distractedly, "I'm going to go see if there's any Fire Nation around. I'll meet up with you guys later." And he walked briskly off.

"What's up with him?" asked Sokka.

Katara just shrugged; she glanced over and spotted the boy they had seen going into a shop on the other side of the street. They followed him into the shop and confronted him about what they had seen in the woods. They learned from Haru, the boy they had seen, and Haru's mother, that earth bending was illegal and that the Fire Nation had taken Haru's father from him for that reason; during their discussion a Fire Nation soldier came in and extorted money from Haru's mother. Luckily they offered to put Aang and company up for the night in their barn.

As Haru was showing them to the barn, Shio walked up, "Man, this place is crawling with Fire Nation! Oh, pardon my manners," he said to Haru, he bowed and said "Thank you for letting us stay here for the night,"

Haru looked closely at the new arrival; suddenly realization and rage filled his eyes. "You!" he shouted pointing an accusing finger at the swordsman, "You're the one who took my father from me!" He bent a boulder out of the ground and hurled it at Shio, who tried to dodge it but took a glancing blow to the side and fell to the ground.

Katara stepped in front of the two "Enough!" she said to Haru, "He's with us!"

"I don't care!" replied the enraged earth bender, "He took my father from me and he has to pay!"

"Is this true?" she asked Shio who was sitting up on the ground, "did you kidnap his father?"

"No, I- damn," said the swordsman.

"What?" Katara asked.

"I can't lie to you; yes I was involved in taking his father," he said hanging his head, "I was part of a Fire Nation squad that put down the rebellion here three years ago,"

**(A/N: Yes I know it was five years ago but I'm going to bend the timeline a little to make this work, hey time bending, there's an idea…) **

"I had just started being friends with Azula and she wanted to test me," he looked up at the furious earth bender "I'm truly sorry, I was confused and misguided back then; but I don't think that excuse is going to be good enough for you."

"No, it isn't," said Haru, "You are not staying here tonight, the rest are welcome though."

Sokka stepped up, "I can vouch for him; he's changed a lot. We were captured by Prince Zuko and locked in a Fire Nation prison; he single-handedly knocked Princess Azula unconscious, broke us out, and killed fifteen guards in the process; and, mind you, this was in the Fire Nation Capital!"

"He's on our side now," added Aang, "At first, I wasn't so sure about him either, but he's saved our butts several times now; I trust him, not as much as these two, but still."

"I'm sorry," Shio said again.

"Take off your glasses and look me in the eye when you say that." said Haru.

"I can't, I would literally go blind if I did."

The earth bender threw up an earth tent around the two of them, "How about now?"

The swordsman removed his glasses, "I am truly sorry for the pain I have caused you and your mother, and I vow to do anything I can to make it up to you."

Haru dropped the tent and nodded, "He can stay." he said and walked off. Katara followed.

"He really has changed," she said as they walked.

"I'll believe it when I see it," replied Haru.

"I know you're mad that he took your father from you; but believe it or not, the Fire Nation has hurt him too."

"How?"

"They took his childhood," Haru gave her a quizzical look; "The Fire Nation destroyed his village when he was a newborn, leaving him an orphan. He was adopted by a swordsman who trained him to be a living weapon from the time he could walk; he never got to have a real father or mother."

"Hmm," said Haru, still not convinced.

"All of us in the group have been affected by the Fire Nation," She put her hand to her necklace, "My mother was killed in a raid on our village; this is all I have left of her…"

"It's not enough," said Haru stating a fact

"No, it's not."

They eventually started walking back to the house; on the way they saw a man trapped in under a mine cave in, and Haru was forced to use his bending to free him. They escorted the man back to the village and went home to get some sleep.

The next morning, as Sokka, Aang and Shio were waking up, Katara burst in yelling "They took Haru!"

"When?" asked Sokka.

"At midnight! This is all my fault!"

"No it's not," said Shio, "From what I heard you did the right thing yesterday."

"Well, I'm going after him," she said, determination burning in her eyes.

"Its way too late for that," Sokka said.

"No it's not;" she replied confidently, "The fire Nation is going to arrest me for earth bending."

Later, as Katara and Sokka rolled a boulder over an air vent Shio rubbed his chin, "You know," he said, "this is just crazy enough to actually work!"

Aang and Shio hid behind a rock as Sokka and Katara staged a fake fight when a Fire Nation patrol came along; Aang almost gave the ruse away when he forgot his cue and made Katara shout "Earth Bending style!" twice. Luckily the soldiers weren't all that bright, and they arrested her anyway. They took her to a Fire Nation prison rig with the other three following the whole time. They waited for twelve hours before going to pick up Katara.

The pick up time came and they landed on the far side of the rig under the cover of night. Aang snuck in and got Katara; "Let's go!" whispered Sokka, "We got to get out of here!"

"I'm not leaving these people," countered Katara and she told them of all the things that had happened to her on the rig. "Well?" she asked after she had finished, "Are you guys going to help me bust these people out or not?"

"I'm in," said Shio, "I relish any opportunity I get to kick some Fire Benders into next week."

"Sure," said Aang, "These people sound like they really need help."

"I'm not going to win this argument, am I?" sighed Sokka.

"Nope," said Katara "Let's go!"

They snuck back into the rig and hid behind a bunch of crates. "You know," said Shio, "Maybe these people would be more willing to fight back if they had some tools to fight back with,"

"Yeah," said Sokka, "If only we had some rock. We could carry some in on Appa, but that would take hours."

"Hey," said Aang, "What about coal?"

"What about it?" said Katara.

"This rig burns coal! So if we could get some up on the deck they could fight!"

"I like it!" said Shio, and the four started to plan.

Just as the sun was starting to rise as they put the finishing touches on their latest plan. Sokka was recapping the details to Katara when a squad of Fire Nation soldiers surrounded them. The two got into fighting stances.

"Katara!" yelled Tyro, Haru's father, "Stop this before someone gets hurt!"

Suddenly the grate in the middle of the deck burst open and the entire coal content of the rig poured out along with one really dirty Air Bender. As Aang dusted himself off Katara climbed on top of the pile "This is your chance Earth Benders!" she shouted to the assembled prisoners, "Your freedom sits right in front of you! Don't waste it!"

To the group's surprise, instead of rushing forward and attacking the Fire Nation troops, the Earth Benders took a step back, apprehension on their faces.

"Stupid girl," laughed the warden, "These people's spirit was broken a long time ago; no matter what you do they will not change." He turned to one of his officers, "Get this cleaned up."

As the warden strode away, a large rock hit him in the back of the head; h turned to see Haru standing there giving him a death glare that could stop time. "No mercy," the Warden snarled and launched an attack at the boy. The other earth benders were forced to act to save the boy and the battle was on.

The earth benders quickly overwhelmed the troops with the warden in the main yard, but reinforcements soon arrived. Sokka charged a group of spearmen and chopped their spears in half with his boomerang and tossed them up to Momo. Shio bounded into a group of soldiers and using a series of non-lethal slashes dispatched the lot of them. As the group was getting ready to make a run for the ships, Aang created a kind of coal machine gun using Air bending; the rest fed coal to it and knocked the rest of the soldiers down. Haru and Tyro made a giant platform using coal and prepared to dump the Fire Nation personnel into the water; the warden pleaded them not to do it because he couldn't swim. "Don't worry, I hear cowards float," replied Tyro and dropped them into the water.

The large group then stole every ship from the rig that they could get their hands on. Katara hugged Tyro and Haru goodbye after many thanks on their part; she joined the other three on Appa. As they flew northward, she caught Shio starring at her with a weird look on his face.

"What?" she asked.

"Huh? Um, er, nothing," replied Shio, clearly embarrassed, "I just noticed that your necklace was gone."

"Oh no! My necklace!"

Back on the prison rig Prince Zuko picked up the necklace; _At last,_ he thought, _I'm back on the trail._

**Sorry it's been so long, I got lazy; I promise the next one will be up in a more timely fashion.**

**As usual, please review!**

**Until next time!**


	8. Friends

**I skipped another few chapters with this one; we pick up at "The Blue Spirit"**

**Just assume that everything in the series happened as normal unless otherwise stated.**

**As usual please review! Your input is always appreciated! **

Chapter 8: Friends

The group had take refuge in an old, abandoned mountain city in order to avoid the crappy weather that was threatening to break. Of course, almost as soon as settled in Sokka got sick.

"Well," said Shio as he helped Katara take care of Sokka, "I think I've actually had this sickness before; he's got all the symptoms: a bad cough, high fever, and hallucinations,"

"Hallucinations?" asked Katara, "What hallucinations?"

"Katara, he thinks Appa is telling jokes; if that's not hallucinating, then I don't know what is."

"Hey," said Aang walking up, "I couldn't find any of the ingredients for the tea; but I did find this map," he said rolling it out, "There's an herbalist institute on that mountain," he said pointing it out, "Maybe they'll have something that'll help."

"I don't know Aang…" Katara said and almost immediately broke into a coughing fit.

"Oh no!" cried Aang, "You've got it too! Now I definitely have to go!"

"I'd better go with you," said Shio, "just to make sure nothing happens. Last thing we need right now is for you to get captured."

"Ok," said Aang, "But what if you get sick?"

"I won't, I've already had this so I'm immune to it."

"Alright," said Aang agreeably, "But my glider is only for one person, how are you going to travel?"

"I don't think either of us is going to be flying tonight," Shio said as lightning flashed across the sky, "Looks like we're running."

"Well, come back soon," croaked Katara from her sleeping bag.

"You sure you'll be ok by yourself?" asked Shio worriedly.

"I'll be fine, just hurry back,"

As the two prepared to leave Aang looked at Shio quizzically, "You know, I'm an airbender; you think you can keep up with me?"

"Sure!" said the older boy, "Without my swords and jacket I'll be almost as fast as you!" he said dropping said items to the floor, "My jacket is weighted so that I can move really fast when I'm not wearing it."

"Aren't you going to be cold?" asked Aang indicating Shio's sleeveless, black shirt.

"Nah, I'm good."

"Alright then, Katara: take care of your self; Shio: eat my dust!" he exclaimed as he dove over the edge of the building.

"Right behind you, Airhead!" Shio shouted following suit.

As the two swiftly covered the ground between their campsite and the institution, Aang was more than a little surprised that Shio was actually able to keep up with him. Aang only had to slow down a little bit from his top speed; Shio made good use of the slipstream Aang left in his wake in order to achieve greater speed than he could unaided. Soon they arrived at the institution and met with the crazy old lady who was the only inhabitant. She wasted a good amount of their time making her cat's dinner; but she advised them to get some frozen frogs for Sokka and Katara to suck on. The two left the building talking about how unusual the old lady was; suddenly there was a high-pitched whistling as four arrows imbedded themselves into the boy's boots, pinning them to the ground.

"Shit!" cursed Shio as he pulled the two arrows out of his boots, "Run!!" he shouted as Aang freed himself. They ran as fast as they could, avoiding the barrage of arrows by mere inches. As they ran, Shio snatched up two sticks from the ground and started batting arrows out of the air. They ended up diving off a cliff into the forest below, and were still pursued by their mysterious assailants.

"Damn it!" said Shio as they fell through the trees.

"What?" asked Aang, "Who are these guys?"

"Yu Yan Archers; they're the best shots in the Fire Nation."

"How can you tell?"

"I got a glimpse of one of them; they have tattoos over their eyes."

"How good are these guys?" asked Aang.

"I heard a rumor once, that these guys can shoot the wings off a fly."

"Wow…"

"Without killing it…"

"We're screwed aren't we…" sighed Aang.

"Yeah, pretty much."

They landed n the swamp below and started slogging through it trying to lose their pursuers. Aang found several frozen frogs and tucked them into his shirt. Eventually, they were cornered and captured by the archers with nets. Obviously they recognized Shio, because they took and broke his glasses rendering him effectively useless without the use of his eyes. They were tied up and thrown into the back of a wagon. Hours later, they arrived at their destination: a massive fortress with a multi story central tower. They were taken to a room in the tower and both were chained to the wall; soon after, someone entered the room.

"Well, well…" said a cold almost monotone voice, "It must be my lucky day: I've caught the Avatar _and_ the Fire Nation's most famous traitor!"

"Zhao…" said Shio, venom all but dripping from his voice.

"That's Admiral Zhao to you."

"Hell no! I don't work for you freaks anymore!"

"Well I suppose it doesn't matter what you call me; you're still my prisoners and no one is coming to save you!"

Zhao threw several more insults at them, and then left.

The two struggled against their chains for a while but eventually gave up on it.

"Hey," said Aang after a few minutes, "You're awfully quiet, you ok?"

"Well. Aside from being unable to open my eyes without blinding myself, I'm fine." replied Shio, "I'm just worried about Katara, she's going to really need those frogs soon."

"Yeah," replied Aang, "I hope she's ok…" they lapsed into silence for a few minutes, then: "Hey…What do you think about Katara?" he asked cautiously.

Caught off guard by the unexpected question, the swordsman balked, "Um, uh, what do you mean?"

"Just what I asked, what do you think of her?"

"Well…She's a good friend to me…Why do you ask?"

"Nothing…I just noticed that you've been spending a lot of time around her lately and I thought there might be something going on."

"Oh, definitely not," said Shio, "She's just a friend; but why are you so interested in what Katara's doing?"

"Oh nothing just wondering," said Aang.

"Uh-huh…" said the older boy disbelievingly, "Come on Aang, you can tell me."

"Tell you what?" said Aang blushing.

He sighed, "If I could open my eyes, I'd be rolling them; it's more than a little obvious that you like her."

Aang looked the other direction blushing a little harder, "Maybe," he responded, "but you haven't exactly been a master of subtly either," he retorted.

"True," conceded Shio, "But in my defense she is quite attractive,"

"Yeah…I just hope she's ok…I don't think I could stand to lose her…"

As Aang said this Shio could sense the truth in his words; Shio thought back to his adventures with the group so far: how Aang had fussed over Katara after he had broken them out of the Fire Nation Capital, how Aang was constantly showing off and trying to get her attention, and how ecstatic he was when he received the least little attention from her. Shio realized that Aang loved her, even though he probably wouldn't admit it; Katara was Aang's anchor: she kept him going. Shio knew that he could never make a move on Katara without crushing Aang and reducing his effectiveness as the Avatar; and since Aang actually loved her and Shio was just attracted to her, the younger boy obviously had dibs.

He was about to tell Aang that he wouldn't make any advances on Katara when all the frogs started climbing out of Aang's shirt.

"Oh no! Come back! I need you for my friends!" yelled Aang.

Suddenly they heard a commotion from the hallway and a figure dressed all in black, carrying twin broad swords, and wearing a blue mask kicked the door in. He ran to them and severed their chains.

"You're rescuing us?" asked Aang rubbing his wrists; the figure gestured for them to follow, "I'll take that as a yes; but we're going to have to go a little slower, my friend here can't see right now."

"I can fix that," said Shio stooping down; he pulled a small roll of gauze from his boot and tied a length of it around his eyes, "This has enough holes so I can see out of it; it'll work until we get outside, then I won't need it: it's night time and i have a spare pair of glasses back at camp."

"Let's go!" said Aang and they were off.

The three quickly sprinted through the halls of the base, avoiding all the guards until they reached the outside. They were climbing the mysterious stranger's rope when the alarm sounded; a soldier cut the rope and sent them tumbling to the ground. They were quickly surrounded by more guards and were forced to fight their way out.

"Hey!" Aang shouted, "The gate's closing! We gotta go!"

"We'll never make it in time!" shouted Shio as he ripped off his eye covering and roundhouse kicked a soldier in the face, "We'll have to find another way around!"

They cleared a space and Aang blasted them up onto the wall. They fought the troops on top of the wall and Shio managed to acquire a couple of swords. They dropped down and repeated the process on the other wall. Now only one wall stood between them and freedom; Aang tried to pole vault across to the other wall using some of the ladders the troops were putting up; but their ladder was burnt right out form under them. They all landed in a heap in front of the main gate.

Some Fire Benders surrounded them and started to blast them with fire, which Aang deflected with air bending.

"Cease fire!" Zhao yelled over the din, "I need the Avatar alive…"

Acting as one Shio and the mysterious stranger each put a sword under Aang's neck. Realizing his predicament, Zhao had the gate opened and the three slowly backed out.

They were almost in the tree line when there was a loud clang and the masked one dropped to the ground; Shio ducked just in time in time to avoid what would have been fatal arrow through his forehead. Aang quickly threw up a dust storm to block the view and looked over at their rescuer; his mask had been knocked clean off, revealing the face of their long time enemy: Prince Zuko.

"Let's go!" said Shio snapping Aang out of it.

"We can't just leave him!"

"Yes we can! Now let's go!"

"I'm not leaving without him…"

"Ugh! Fine…"

They each grabbed Zuko and ran into the forest.

Hours later Zuko woke up and Aang tried to convince him to become allies with them to no avail and the two boys ran back the swamp for more frogs.

"Hey," said Shio as they ran back to camp, "I wasn't really going to decapitate you back there; i was bluffing."

"Yeah I know," replied Aang.

They arrived back at camp, gave Katara and Sokka the frogs and almost promptly lay down. Shio was soon fast asleep; but Aang lay awake wondering if he really could get Zuko to join them some day.

**Well another chapter down! Next one will probably feature their arrival at the N. Pole!**

**Sorry it took so long to get this one up… I got lazy.**

**As usual please review!**

**Happy Easter everyone!**

**Until next time!**


	9. Masters and Pupils

**Yet another Chapter skip! This time we pick up at "The Waterbending Master"**

**As usual I don't own avatar. **

**Enjoy and please review! **

**I always value my reader's opinions.**

Chapter 9: Masters and Pupils

The ten ton flying bison dipped lower and lower toward the water. He was tired from flying for two days straight and the bickering children on his back didn't help matters.

"Just saying," complained Sokka, "but can Appa go any higher?"

"Ok, why don't we all climb on your back and you can fly us to the North Pole?" retorted Aang irritably.

"Oh would you two just shut the hell up!" Shio snapped as he polished his broad sword. "I can't hear myself think over you two idiots!"

"Ok, ok," said Katara trying to ease the flaring tempers, "We're all just a little cranky from all this flying,"

"Yeah, all right," said Shio standing up with his sword, "I'm going to try one more time to get their attention if they're watching." He angled his sword so that the shiny surface reflected sunlight and twisted the sword around so it flashed. After several minutes he sat back down, "Nothing," he said, "We're never going to find the Northern tribe…"

Suddenly a block of ice froze itself to Appa's leg, causing him to collide with an iceberg which sent them flying through the air like a Frisbee. They landed in the center of a ring of Water Tribe boats.

"Well I can say one thing about the water tribe," said Shio, "They have excellent timing."

* * *

As soon as they found out who the strange children were, the Water Tribesmen escorted them to the northern settlement.

"It's…smaller than I remember," said Shio as they approached the gigantic ice wall that protected the village.

The other three gazed up at the massive white wall with the Water Tribe Symbol carved into it.

"That's right," said Katara, turning to him, "You've been here before."

"Eight years ago," said Shio with a far away look on his face. They lowered a section of the wall in front of them and they passed through. "Now I do have to warn you," he said as they passed through a complicated series of locks that raised the water level so they could access the city, "The Northern Tribe has some customs that many consider to be rather odd and they're really anal about enforcing them, so be careful."

The others were hardly listening, though; they were marveling at the beauty of all the buildings. As they sailed through some canals they passed by several other boats; in one of these boats was a white haired beauty that Sokka couldn't take his eyes off of.

"Who's she?" he asked dreamily.

"I think that's Princess Yue," answered Shio, "I met her briefly when I was here eight years ago. She's certainly um, filled out a little since then."

"Yeah…" said Sokka still lost in dreamland.

"Perverts," Katara muttered shaking her head.

They were escorted to the Palace, where they were taken to a courtyard where a party was going to be thrown. They found out that the party was for Princess Yue's sixteenth birthday and her father, Chief Arnook, was going all out. Sokka and Katara were treated as if they actually belonged to the Northern Tribe and Shio and Aang were treated as honored guests. As the group ate and Sokka tried to sweet talk Princess Yue, an elaborate waterbending demonstration was put on by the local master and two students.

"That's the guy I studied under," Shio whispered to Katara and Aang, "Master Pakku is a very strict teacher but he'll teach you what you need to know."

After the meal, Aang and Shio went with chief Arnook to meet Master Pakku.

"Master Pakku? This is your new student: the Avatar." the Chief said, "And I believe you already know this young man," he added, gesturing to Shio.

"Master," said Shio bowing, "It's been a while,"

"That it has." said Master Pakku, turning to Aang "Just because you're the Avatar, don't expect any special treatment."

"No sir." replied Aang, "My friend and I can't wait to start training under you."

"Master? Would you mind if I tagged along? I would like to brush up on a few forms so I can improve my defense."

"That would be fine Shio; I'll see the three of you at dawn."

* * *

The next morning, Aang, Katara and Shio arrived where they were to be trained and introduced Katara to Master Pakku.

"There must be a mistake," he said noticing Katara, "In my culture women are not allowed to learn waterbending."

Katara and Aang tried to argue the point and Aang even threatened to find another master but Master Pakku wouldn't budge. Katara insisted that Aang stay and be trained even if she couldn't.

As she walked away Shio, who had been silent this whole time, turned and glared at the waterbending teacher.

"Yes Shio?" asked the older man, "Do you have something to add?"

Shio opened his mouth as if to say something than quickly closed it, "No master, Nothing."

And with that the lesson began.

That evening as Aang and Shio were walking back to their quarters, Aang was fuming, "Why didn't you tell us that women aren't allowed to learn waterbending?"

Shio sighed, "I guess I should have mentioned it; but the last time I was here they were starting to lean away from many of the old outdated customs; I thought by now they'd have done away with that one entirely."

"It's such a stupid custom!" shouted Aang.

"I agree," said Shio, "But no matter how stupid they seem, we have to abide by the rules as long as we're here."

Aang snorted and they lapsed into silence.

When they arrived at their quarters, it was apparent that everyone had had a pretty lousy day. Apparently Sokka had been all but told to get lost by Princess Yue. When he heard of their predicament, he suggested that Aang teach Katara what he learned about waterbending. They thought it was a good idea and went off to practice; Shio tagged along just to keep an eye on things.

No sooner had they gotten started when Master Pakku broke it up and told all three of them that he wouldn't teach them anymore. Aang and Katara protested but the teacher refused and insulted them several times while he was at it. By the end of this, Shio was shaking in anger at his former master.

Master Pakku noticed this, "Shio you look very angry; do have something you want to say to me?"

The other two looked at him expectantly, "No master, I don't." he said looking down at his feet.

For the second time that day they stalked angrily back to their quarters.

"Aang still needs to learn waterbending!" fretted Katara, "We need to get master Pakku to take him back!"

"Agreed," said Shio, "I think I have an idea, we can go to Chief Arnook and see if he can get master Pakku to change his mind."

"Fine," said Aang, "But I noticed that, yet again, you didn't bother to say anything in our defense." Aang said accusingly to Shio.

Shio hung his head, "Yeah, I'm sorry. He's my old teacher and I don't want to disrespect him. If I did it would ruin my reputation around here for good."

"Well I think you better decide what's more important to you, your friends or your reputation." said Katara sternly.

The next morning found them standing in front of the village elders, pleading their case.

"I think master Pakku would be more inclined to take the Avatar back if you were to apologize…" said Chief Arnook.

"Fine…"said Katara reluctantly.

"Well? I'm waiting little girl…" said master Pakku smugly.

At that, Katara lost it, "No! There is no way I'm apologizing to a sour old man like you!" she shouted, causing several cracks to appear in the ice they used as the floor, "I'll be outside if you're man enough to fight me!" she challenged and stalked out of the chamber.

"Daaamn…" said Shio, "That was…impressive."

"She didn't mean it," said Aang.

"I'm pretty sure she did…" said Sokka, and the three of them ran after Katara.

Several minutes later, master Pakku came out of the palace.

"So," said Katara, "You decided to show up. Well? Aren't you going to fight me?"

"No," he said conceitedly, as he kept walking, "It would be a waste of time and effort. I've seen that…thing that you refer to as bending."

Katara was about to retort but she felt something rush by her; she looked over and saw that Shio was gone.

Up ahead, master Pakku stopped in his tracks, feeling something poking him in the chest. He looked down and was surprised to find the tip of a broad sword poking him in the solar plexus.

"Yes Shio?" he asked, his eyes narrowing, "Do you have something to say?"

"Yeah," replied the swordsman, "Actually I do… I think you're the one who owes Katara an apology instead of the other way around. You've been nothing but rude to her ever since you met us!"

"She deserves no apology," replied the master bender snidely, "She refuses to respect our customs."

"That's because they're stupid!" said Katara.

"Little girl," said Master Pakku with obvious contempt, "Why don't you go back to the healing huts with the other women where you belong."

"Oh, you just crossed the line…" said Shio angrily.

"Whose line? Yours?" asked Pakku smugly.

"No," he replied, sheathing the sword, "Hers." He said as Katara smacked the old man upside the head with a water whip.

"You wanted to learn to fight so badly?" Pakku said whipping around, "Then watch closely!"

A crowd quickly gathered to watch the two benders go at it. Master Pakku obviously had the advantage, but Katara was able to hold her own.

"Holy crap!" commented Shio as Katara produced a small ice pillar and began throwing razor-sharp ice discs at Master Pakku, "When did she get so good? I know she's been practicing with the waterbending scroll, but still…She's got talent!"

The fight ended when the old man created an ice cage and trapped Katara in it. Her hair was hanging lose and her necklace had fallen off during the intense battle.

Master Pakku, recognizing it, walked over and picked it up. He explained that he had been Katara's grandmother's arranged husband; but she ad ran away in order to avoid having to marry someone she didn't love. During this discussion princess Yue got upset and ran off, Sokka quickly chased after her.

Katara, Shio, and Aang discussed things with master Pakku and he agreed to take Aang back as well as teach Katara waterbending. Shio hung back to talk to the old man, "I just wanted to apologize for the way I talked to you earlier; I was way out of line."

Pakku held up a hand, "No, it is I who was out of line; I should have treated you and your friends with more respect. Honestly I was surprised that you didn't say something earlier."

"I wish I had, I was getting tired of sucking up to you anyway."

Pakku chuckled and they walked back into the town.

**This one turned out pretty good!**

**Next chapter will be the siege of the north! I can't wait to write this one!**

**As usual please review!**

**Until next time!**


	10. Moonlit Battlefield

**Woot! 10 chapters peoples! **

**Thanks to everyone who has read this. And a special thanks to those of you who have reviewed!**

**This is the last chapter of book 1; I'll be moving on to book II next.**

**If there's anything you'd like to see, just let me know! **

**So sorry for this being so late! Got swamped with school work!**

Chapter 10: Moonlit Battlefield

Shio and Aang watched, amazed, as Katara easily defeated every challenger to face her in the sparring ring.

"Wow," said Aang, "She's really good!"

"Yeah," said Shio, "All of you have gotten much better at fighting since I met you. All those drills and sparring matches I put you guys through on the way here have helped a lot."

"Yeah, thanks for that." said Aang gratefully.

"No, I'm the one who should be thanking you," the swordsman replied, "Before I met you guys, I was headed down a dark, violent path, you turned me around. You made me promise you that I wouldn't kill anyone unless absolutely necessary. True, I did have to radically change my fighting style, but I have kept my promise to date."

"Uh, you're welcome I guess." said Aang.

Aang looked back to Katara as she finished off yet another of Master Pakku's pupils; he soon acquired a rather dreamy look in his eye.

"She's really something, isn't she?" said Shio, noticing where Aang was staring.

"Yeah," said Aang happily, but then his face drooped, "I don't think I have a chance with her though; I mean there are so many other guys out there! There's Haru, Jet, heck maybe even you!"

"Me? Ha! As if…" laughed Shio, "No way; as I said she is attractive, but I don't see myself ever having a…relationship with her…It'd be too weird."

"Why?"

"Well," Shio faltered, wracking his brain for a plausible excuse (See his real reason in Ch 8: Friends), "I guess I'm just a little too old, it would be like you dating a ten year old or something. It'd be really awkward."

"Oh," said Aang trying to sound neutral, but in his head he was celebrating.

* * *

"Maybe in another few years you'll be ready to fight a sea sponge," said Master Pakku as he berated the latest student to fall to Katara. "Anyone else want to step into the sparring ring?"

There was silence for a few moments, then "I will,"

Shio stood up and grabbed the two wooden sparring swords he had carved a while back. "I want to see how good you've really gotten." he said slowly twirling his swords.

Katara smiled and dropped back into a fighting stance.

Shio made the first move, somersaulting over her and aiming a blow at her head as he passed over; she blocked this with a sheet of ice and countered with a rain of icicles, all of which Shio either dodged or blocked.

The battle continued for quite some time; the other students watched with awe as the sword master and the waterbending prodigy sparred. After about ten minutes neither had scored a hit on the other.

"Truce?" asked Shio as they stood across from each other, breathing hard.

"Truce." she agreed.

"You're a whole lot better from when I first met you."

"So have you," she said, "You're using a lot more defensive maneuvers than you used to."

"I guess I ha-" Shio broke off in mid sentence and sniffed the air.

"What?" asked Katara concerned.

"I don't know, something's off…"

At that moment black snow began to fall from the sky.

"Uh-oh" said Shio, "They've found us."

"Who's found us?" asked Katara.

"The Fire Nation, they finally decided to take on the Northern Tribe."

* * *

Aang, Katara, and Master Pakku quickly ran to the palace to warn everyone while Shio ran to their quarters to grab his real weapons. By the time he arrived at the palace there were already warriors beating on the village war drums. The village gathered in the palace and Chief Arnook asked for the aid of the Moon and Ocean spirits; The Chief then asked for volunteers for a special mission. Sokka eagerly volunteered.

"What are you doing?" asked Shio, "You've got nothing to prove to us…" the other two nodded in agreement.

"No, But I have something to prove to her." He said indicating Princess Yue, and walked up to receive the chief's mark.

Later, the group gathered on the giant wall defending the Tribe. They were all scanning the horizon, looking for the first Fire Navy ship.

"I have a contact," said Shio, "Just coming over the horizon now."

"I see it," said Sokka, "But what the hell is that glowing thing?"

"Oh, Fu-"

Luckily for the rating of this story, Shio was interrupted as the first flaming projectile smashed into the wall, sending them all tumbling. As the rest of the group dug themselves out from under the debris, Aang jumped on Appa and went to take out the lead Fire Navy ship.

* * *

The rest could do nothing but watch as Aang took on the troops on the ship. After a few minutes, several boats of waterbenders sailed out and froze the boat in the water.

"Uh-oh…" said Shio.

"What?" asked Katara.

"Look at the horizon, against the ash clouds."

"Oh…" she said as she saw the rest of the Fire Navy arrive behind the scout ship. "What can we do?"

"Nothing," Shio replied, "all we can do is wait."

Later, towards sunset, the Fire Nation ships ceased launching fireballs and dropped anchor for the night.

Aang returned on Appa and slid down one of the bison's massive forelegs, exhausted. "I can't do it!" he said the strain of the day showing in his voice as Shio, Katara, and Yue gathered around, "I must have taken out a dozen warships, but they just keep coming! I can't do this!"

"You have to!" exclaimed Yue, "You're the Avatar!"

"I'm just a kid." Aang replied quietly.

"Come on," said Katara helping Aang to his feet, "You need to relax."

Suddenly they all heard a commotion from the warrior's barracks.

"I'll see what's up." said Shio, "You guys go on ahead."

He walked in just as Chief Arnook was breaking up a fight between Sokka and Hahn, the leader of the special mission.

"Sokka, you're off the mission!" the chief said.

Soon everyone left the barracks, leaving Sokka and Shio alone.

"What happened?" asked Shio, crossing his arms.

"That was the guy who's going to marry Yue!" said Sokka angrily, "He said a few choice words about me so I punched him. Yue deserves better than him."

Shio sighed, "I told you when we got here Sokka: they have odd customs here; and as long as we choose to accept their hospitality, we have to abide by them."

"But he's such an ass-hole! And the weird thing is she actually wants to marry him! But not because she likes him, it's for the good of her people!"

"If you really love her," said Shio putting a hand on Sokka's shoulder, "You'll respect her wishes."

Sokka opened his mouth as if to say something, and then shut it and sighed deeply.

Just then Chief Arnook came back and assigned Sokka to guard his daughter during the rest of the invasion.

"She's with Katara right now," said Shio standing up, "Let's go find them."

They searched for a couple hours but had no luck finding them. They were just about to give up when Yue ran up to them.

"Katara's in trouble!" she exclaimed breathlessly, She told them that a boy with a scar had burst in on Aang when he was in the spirit world, and started fighting Katara. "I ran as soon as it started," she said, "I don't know what ended up happening."

"We're near the stables," Sokka said, "We'll grab Appa and drop in from above."

They arrived to find Katara picking herself up off the ground; there was no sign of Aang or Zuko.

"Zuko took him," she exclaimed franticly, "We have to go after him!"

"Well he can't have gotten far," said Shio, "you guys go look for him; I want to stay here and help out the troops fighting the ground forces."

Sokka nodded, "Good luck."

"You too."

* * *

As the rest of the group took off, Shio raced down to where the Water Tribe warriors were gathering. He was assigned to a special commando unit; their job was to render aid wherever they thought necessary. They did their best to stop the Fire Nation advance: Shio dropped stun explosives into tanks, they sabotaged some catapults, and they snuck behind enemy lines and took out several squads before having to retreat.

The battle was still raging as the full moon rose; this gave the waterbenders the advantage they needed to push the Fire Nation back and Shio was able to take off his glasses now that it was dark. Shio saw a large group of Fire Nation spearmen rushing a smaller group of warriors. Quickly he stepped in front of them as the enemy approached' once they were in range he signaled to one of the waterbenders in his squad.

"Seal me up!" he shouted.

Instantly a giant dome of ice sprang up around the swordsman and the Fire Nation troops, sealing all of them inside. Just enough light for Shio to see penetrated the walls; but the soldiers were left in the dark.

"Tell me boys…" he said doing his best impression of a demon, "Are you afraid of the dark?"

Five minutes later, he cut his way out of the dome and his squad mate took down the dome to reveal a bunch of severely wounded soldiers.

"Hey!" said the waterbender that had erected the dome, "I just saw Zhao go that way, Towards the Spirit Oasis!"

Without a word Shio turned and started sprinting to where the man who had caused all this destruction was waiting.

* * *

As he neared the Oasis the world went read as a crimson veil covered the moon. He saw Appa fly into the oasis from above. As he entered the sacred place, Zhao was holding a bag with something wriggling in it.

"They will call me Zhao…The Invincible!"

Suddenly Momo came out of nowhere and attacked Zhao, who threw the lemur off after a few seconds.

"Drop it Zhao." said Aang.

Zhao looked up and saw that he had an Airbending staff, a broadsword, a boomerang and a sphere of water all aimed at him.

"No!" he shouted, aiming his flame covered fist at the wriggling bag, "It is my destiny to destroy the moon!"

"Don't do it Zhao!" yelled Iroh, suddenly appearing across the chamber, "Anything you do to that spirit I will unleash on you tenfold!"

Zhao seemed to consider this; then placed the fish back in the water; suddenly his face contorted in anger, and he sent a blazing slash of fire across the small pond.

"No!" yelled Yue, running towards the water as the world was suddenly drained of color.

Iroh launched himself at Zhao, but was blocked by firebenders Zhao had brought along. He defeated the benders in a matter of seconds, but it was too late: Zhao was gone.

They all knelt by the pond and Iroh picked up the pure white fish's limp form.

"It's gone…" he said shaking his head sadly.

"Damn…" said Shio slamming his fist on the ground half-heartedly.

"It's over…" said Yue hopelessly.

"NO, it is NOT over." said Aang in a voice that sent chills down everyone's spines.

They all looked at him and saw he was in the Avatar State. He walked over to the pond and stood in the center and the ocean spirit, La, circled around his legs. Suddenly Aang was sucked under and glowing ripples of water spread from the spot and formed itself into a massive Koi Fish.

Shio suddenly put a hand on the hilt of his broadsword, "Never done that before…" he muttered.

"What?" asked Katara.

"As soon as he entered the Avatar state," Shio said pointing at the Koi fish that was wiping out all the Fire Nation troops in the city, "My sword started to vibrate."

"That's really weird," said Sokka, "Why do you think it's doing that?"

"It's only a theory, but legend has it that a previous incarnation of the Avatar forged this sword."

"But how does that help us now?" asked Yue, "The world will tear itself to pieces if the Moon spirit isn't restored!"

"Uh, Yue?" asked Shio staring at the distraught princess, "Your eyes are glowing."

Iroh looked over, "You've been touched by the Moon Spirit," he said, "Some of its life is in you."

"Yes," she said, "It gave me life, maybe I can give it back."

"No!" said Sokka grabbing her hand, "I won't let you!"

"It's my duty, Sokka." She replied almost emotionlessly.

"Your father told me to protect you!" he protested.

"I have to do this." She pulled out of his grasp and placed her hands on the fish. The fish glowed under her touch; she closed her eyes and moments later crumpled to the ground.

"No!" yelled Sokka, cradling her limp body, "She's gone…"

Suddenly, her body glowed briefly and vanished; Iroh placed the fish back in the water and it immediately swam to join its partner.

The surface of the water began to glow and a ghostly image of Yue appeared above its surface. She was wearing a long, flowing white dress that seemed to billow all on its own, even though there was no wind. She was the most beautiful thing that Sokka had ever seen.

"Goodbye Sokka," she said in an unearthly voice, "I'll always be with you." Then she drew him in and kissed him before fading out.

Just then the moon's light bathed the landscape once more.

"Hey," said Shio, "My sword's not vibrating anymore." They all rushed to the door and peered out at the city.

"Yes! They're retreating!" said Katara spotting the fleeing Fire Nation ships on the horizon, "But why do I see firebending in that direction?" She asked pointing to a bridge in the distance.

"Probably just some Waterbenders taking care of the last of the firebenders." said Shio dismissing the bright flashes, "We should help the wounded." he said, and the group walked down to the village.

They carried the wounded and buried the dead until morning broke. They finally took some time to rest; Sokka was talking with a very sad looking chief Arnook. Aang was looking out at the setting moon, when Katara walked up behind him. They looked at each other, and then hugged wordlessly, glad to be alive. Shio and Sokka came up to the group and stood next to the others; together they looked out at the expanse of water and wondered what was in store for them next…

**Well that's it for Book I! I'm going to take a couple-week break and write an addition to my first story; then I'll pick it up again at Azula's first appearance in season two!**

**Thanks again for reading and please leave a review! I love to hear from my readers!**

**Until next time!**


	11. NotSoHappy Returns

**Well here we are starting book II!**

**After the epic failure of "the Last Airbender" I figured we all needed some relief.**

**Anyhoo we pick the gang up as they are trekking to Omashu.**

AEWFS Ch11: Not-so-Happy Returns

"I'd rather kiss you than die!" Shio asked disbelievingly, "you actually said that to her?"

Shio and Aang were hanging behind the rest of the group on their way to see King Bumi in the City of Omashu; Aang was telling Shio what had happened to him and Katara in the Cave of two lovers.

"Yeah," said Aang blushing and avoiding eye contact, "I felt pretty stupid afterwards."

"Well you should have! You blew it man! That was your big chance!" said Shio throwing up his hands in exasperation.

"Well it turned out alright in the end; we actually almost kissed as the torch went out." Aang said adopting a dreamy look on his face.

"Well that's different," said Shio, "Good for you, just take it slowly and eventually it'll pay off, or so I've been told." Shio said slapping Aang on the back.

Aang looked at Shio oddly, "You're awfully unbothered by this," he said, "I thought you liked her too?"

"I did, well I still do; but the way I see it you met her first so I think you get dibs."

Aang was about to reply when Sokka yelled from the front of the group, "I present to you the Earth Kingdom city of O-" he stopped in mid-sentence at the sight of the city.

"Oh crap," Shio finished for him, "this makes things slightly more complicated."

They were looking at Omashu under Fire Nation rule; already the city looked much drearier.

"Omashu always seemed so…untouchable." said Aang sadly.

"It was," Sokka said bitterly, "Ba Sing Se is the last Earth Kingdom stronghold now."

Shio snorted, "At the rate the Fire Nation's going it won't be for long; but it's probably the safest place for us to be right now."

"No," said Aang firmly, "I'm going after Bumi."

"Aang…" said Katara gently, "someone else can teach you earthbending."

"This isn't about finding a teacher! This is about finding a friend! I'm going even if you three wont!" said Aang taking a step away from the other three.

Shio shrugged and stood next to Aang, "I'm in I liked King Bumi!"

Appa gave a bellow and lumbered over to Shio and Aang.

"Damn…" Sokka said dropping his head in defeat, "I guess we can't argue with our transportation." He sighed.

* * *

Soon they found themselves outside a drainage pipe in the outside of the city. As the Air Monk pried the cover off the hatch, noxious fumes hit the trio.

"Oh you have got to be kidding me…" Shio said.

"Nope!" replied Aang cheerfully.

"Remind me why I volunteered for this?" Shio asked as he stashed his broadsword in Aapa's saddle and adjusted his short swords so they couldn't be seen.

Five minutes later they surfaced in an abandoned street. Shio and Sokka emerged looking like things that came from the black lagoon. After being hosed off and air dried by Katara and Aang they discovered that they were covered in pentapusses. After yanking them off, they had several welts.

Shio pulled the dark glasses off his face now that it was dark enough for him to see, "Man, it's good to get these off," he said.

Sokka shivered, "Your eyes still creep me out."

"Be nice." said Katara elbowing him in the ribs.

"Hey! What are you kids doing?" a loud voice from behind them yelled.

The four of them turned and came face to face with a Fire Nation patrol. They managed to talk their way out of it by convincing the soldiers that Shio and Sokka had a case of "Pentapox": a very deadly and contagious disease. As the soldiers ran away in fear, they all breathed a sigh of relief and continued on their search for Bumi.

They were sneaking around the city's upper terrace, near the new construction project, when a loud rumbling sound caught the group's attention. They quickly spotted a bunch of boulders rolling towards a group walking on the level below them.

Without missing a beat, Aang blasted the boulders away with a tremendous blast of air.

"It's the resistance!" came a muffled shout from below.

One figure from the group bounded up to their tier and began to run at them.

"Run!" Shio yelled, "We've been made!"

The girl ran after the four firing arrows at them from wrist launchers. Aang whipped around and brought down some nearby scaffolding, blocking the girl's pursuit of them. The girl quickly whipped two throwing knives at the small monk; Aang brought his staff up to block but as he did he heard a metallic whine as two shuriken thrown by Shio whizzed by either side of his head and deflected those thrown by their mysterious assailant. As Shio prepared to throw more, the ground dropped out from under the Avatar's group, plunging them into a dimly lit cavern.

* * *

There they met the leader of the resistance. He said that on the day of the invasion Bumi had ordered Omashu's military to stand down and do nothing, so the fire nation had taken the city easily. The leader wanted to say in the city and fight, but Aang managed to convince him to get his people out of his city. They debated for a while on how to do this, until Sokka came up with a brilliant, everyone in the city came down with "Pentapox".

So the next day the entire population of the city lurched out of the city unbothered by the guards, who were all "pretty sure they had heard of pentapox".

Aang stayed in the city to search for Bumi and didn't return until late that night riding Bumi's pet "Flopsi."

"No Bumi…" Aang said sadly shaking his head. Katara came up and hugged him, knowing he needed all the support he could get.

Just then the leader of the resistance came up and informed them that they had found an extra person in their head count: a small Fire Nation baby, who was busy abusing Momo.

Later after they had settled in around the campfire, Aang made an announcement, "I'm going after Bumi again tomorrow."

"Aang it was dangerous enough this time, but now…" Katara said worriedly.

"You might not have to go after him," Shio said walking up, holding a letter in his hand, "I just got this from a messenger hawk, it's from the governor of Omashu! Apparently, we thus baby is his son, and he thinks we've kidnapped him! He's willing to trade the baby for Bumi!"

* * *

They arrived at the designated meeting point early the next morning; it was at the bottom of the construction project which turned out to be a massive statue of Fire Lord Ozai.

"I still say that this is a trap…" said Shio cynically.

"Nah," said Aang good-naturedly, "I've got a good feeling about this!"

"Knowing our luck it won't last long…" Shio said rolling his eyes behind his glasses.

No sooner had he said it then the Fire Nation party showed up; and Team Avatar all gasped. They party consisted of three people: the girl who had attacked them last night, an oddly dressed girl with a midriff baring outfit that no one recognized, the last girl everyone recognized

"It's Azula!" said Katara turning to run.

"Wait." said Shio grabbing her wrist, "She sees us but I'm not seeing any signs of recognition directed toward you three…play it cool for now.

"Well, well," said the Fire Princess in a drawling monotone, "Shio, what a surprise; I was a little surprised when they told me you had joined the other side. Is this what you've been doing while I've been in a coma for two months?"

"Yeah," replied Shio coolly, "I had a change of heart; I got sick of you treating me like crap." Without turning away from Azula, he spoke quietly to the group, "she really doesn't remember, she must have amnesia from when I hit her in the head with my sword."

"No matter," Azula said, "Proceed Mai," she said to the girl that had attacked them last night.

"Do you have my little brother?" she asked stepping forward.

"Right here. Do you have Bumi?" asked Aang

Mai gestured and Bumi was lowered down on a construction crane, his body entombed in a metal coffin.

"Hi everybody!" he said as he came to the ground.

They were about to make the trade, when Azula made a comment about how trading a king for a two-year old was unfair and Mai called off the deal.

Frustrated, Aang launched himself at Azula who blasted blue flames at him. Aang deftly dodged and started climbing after Bumi's retreating prison with Azula in hot pursuit.

That just left Mai and the girl with the long braid and midriff baring outfit. The girl with the braid, who was obviously an acrobat of some kind, tried to somersault over Katara and Shio's heads in order to get to Sokka and the baby, as Mai shot arrows at them as a distraction. ; But Shio and Katara firmly planted themselves in front of Sokka.

"Katara, you take the emo chick, the acrobat's mine…" Shio said sheathing his swords out of fairness, since the braided girl had no weapons.

As Mai and Katara moved off trading blows, the braided girl smirked at Shio and ran at him, trying to hit him with a series of lightning fast, two-fingered jabs at various points on his body; all of which Shio parried.

"Damn, you're quick," he said as he regained his balance, "But I'm just as fast," he said as he swept her feet out from under her. She turned her fall into a handspring and landed several meters away.

She smiled at him, obviously enjoying the challenge he presented. They ran at each other, trading blows, but neither able to land a solid hit. To an observer their hands would have looked like little more than blurs, they were moving so fast.

After several minutes they paused, breathing hard; then they launched themselves at each other. Each saw an opening and took it; each hit a pressure point at the base of the other's neck. Shio was familiar with the style the girl used and decided to try a move on her.

"Did you just-?" asked Shio.

"Oh dear," said the girl in a high-pitched, cheerful voice, "We landed a time-delay paralysis strike at the same time!"

"Seems so," Shio said, "We had better sit down, it's going to kick in in less than a minute."

"There it goes," the girl said almost as soon as they sat down.

"Same here," replied Shio, "at least that move gives us the freedom to still turn our heads."

"Yeah."

As Shio looked at the mysterious girl, he noted that she was quite beautiful; she had a perfect hourglass figure and the muscles of an athlete. Her long brown hair seemed to shimmer in the sunlight, and her eyes were the same color as his light brown ones; and she smelled wonderful, Shio couldn't place the smell but he was instantly attracted to it and to her.

"What?" she asked as she caught him staring at her.

"Nothing!" he said quickly, "So you're one of Azula's friends?"

"Yup! I'm Ty Lee, who are you?"

"You can call me S… ah hell, my name is Shio."

"Oh yeah! Azula told me about you! She said you were an amazing fighter; and you certainly didn't disappoint!"

"Well, thank you! You're very good yourself! It's been a long time since I've met someone who can keep up with my speed."

"Thanks!" she said smiling warmly at him.

"So, if you're one of Azula's friends, why have I never seen you before?"

"Well, I joined the circus about three years ago; right around the time you came along."

"You were in the circus?"

"Yup, I was an acrobat!"

"Surprise, surprise."

Ty Lee laughed; it sounded rather musical to Shio.

"Well, you smell awful nice after hanging around such a smelly environment." He said blushing.

She giggled, "Thanks! So why did you leave Azula? From what I heard, you two were pretty close."

"We were, but I got sick of her bossing me around; and honesty she was getting more and more…psychotic, for lack of a better word."

"I know what you mean," Ty Lee replied, her face adopting a more serious look, "she can be a bit much at times, but she's like a sister to me."

"Well if you ever do get sick of her," said Shio making a snap decision, "you're always welcome to join our group…"

"Why would I do that?" she asked with a puzzled expression, "I can't betray my friends!"

"Just an offer…" Shio said defensively.

Suddenly they saw Aang zip by with Bumi's prison with Katara and Sokka close behind him on Appa.

"Whoops!" said Shio standing up, "gotta go!"

"Wha-, how are you standing up?" asked Ty Lee staring in wonder.

"Easy, I know how to counter that move: tense the muscles in your neck at the moment of impact." He walked towards the edge.

"If you could move, why did you stay?" she asked

"you seemed like a very interesting person to talk to!" he replied blushing slightly, "Well it's been nice talking to you Ty Lee but I gotta go; think about my offer!"

"I will! Bye!" she replied cheerily.

Shio leapt off the edge and landed on Appa just as they passed under him."

"Wow," Ty Lee said to herself, "he's really cute!"

"Damn, she's hot…" Shio muttered to himself as he landed on Appa.

"What?" asked Katara.

"Nothing," replied Shio, "How did your fight go?"

"Alright," Katara said shrugging, "She landed a few blows but I won in the end. Yours?

"Alright, I think I made a new friend."

Katara raised an eyebrow but didn't make any further comments.

They picked up Aang after losing him while he was being chased by Azula.

He said they needed to find someone who listens before striking to teach him earthbending.

"Well we better start looking," Shio said absentmindedly, his mind lingering on the mysterious acrobat he had met so briefly. He hoped he'd see her again someday.

**This is the first post from my new laptop!**

**Anyway sorry for not posting lately, I've been really busy!**

"**The blind Bandit" is up next!**

**Till next time!**


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